• arrogant and selfish; self-centred
• cynical and scornful outlook on life; contempt for convention, social norms and religious practices
• defiant and rebellious nature; challenging social norms and authority
• pursuit of personal goal; self-serving decisions
• sense of loneliness and societal isolation; feeling like an outcast from society
• dark, brooding, gloomy and moody demeanour
• melancholic and contemplative mindset
• profound sense of loss, guilt, misery or remorse – resulting from a troubled past; haunted
• propensity for self-destruction
• profound affection; deeply passionate, often tumultuous love
• tendency to hurt those they care about
• rare moments of altruism and selfless acts
• charismatic, alluring persona and magnetic personality
• world-weary wisdom; adding to their mysterious appeal
He confronts his fate and attempts to commit suicide. He then seeks out the Witch of the Alps but is unable to meet her requirements. Attempting to communicate with Astarte directly, Manfred visits Arimanes, the king of the underworld. Astarte’s spirit appears briefly and predicts his imminent demise.
Back at his castle, Manfred is visited by the Abbot of St. Maurice – but refuses to conform to his religious practices. Finally, defying all religious and spiritual authority, he rejects offers of salvation and redemption, and dies alone and unrepentant – ultimately giving his soul to neither heaven nor hell – only to death.
It was in the tower of his castle that Count Manfred studied and practiced magic. The only person ever allowed into the tower was his sister, Astarte. Following her death, it became his place of solitude and a private sanctuary.
His magic conjures up the spirit of his star in the shape of his recently deceased love, but she quickly disappears. The spirit can read his mind and acknowledges that Manfred believes Astarte to be a part of him because of their shared beliefs in magic and their love.
It becomes apparent later in the poem that Manfred did not actually physically kill Astarte but felt that he had caused her death by breaking her heart – ‘Not with my hand, but heart – Which broke her heart.’ The deepest feelings of guilt and devastation haunt him thereafter.
Manfred on the Jungfrau by Ford Madox Brown
Manfred is interrupted by the Chamois Hunter who prevents him from committing suicide.
Friend!
Have a care - Your next step may be fatal! – for the love
Of him who made you, stand not on that brink!
The Chamois Hunter takes
Manfred to his cottage to recover. Following this incident, Manfred seeks out
the Witch of the Alps to ask her for help to alleviate his dreadful condition.
He explains to her his affinity with, and his deep love for, Astarte.
Her hair, her features, all, to the very tone
Even of her voice, they said were like to mine;
But soften’d all, and temper’d into beauty:
I loved her, and destroy’d her!
Not with my hand, but heart – which broke her heart –
It gazed on mine, and wilter’d. I have shed –
Blood, but not hers – and yet her blood was shed –
I saw – and could not staunch it.
I have pray’d
For madness as a blessing – ’tis denied me!
The Witch claims that she
cannot help him directly to forget his guilt or Astarte’s death and suggests
that he becomes her servant.
That is not in my province; but if thou
Wilt swear obedience to my will, and do
My bidding, it may help thee to thy wishes.
Manfred refuses outright –
asserting that he is not prepared to become a slave of the spirits he has
commanded through his magic.
I will not swear – Obey! and whom? the spirits
Whose presence I command and be the slave
Of those who served me – Never!
Attempting to communicate
with Astarte himself directly, Manfred sets off to visit Arimanes – an evil god
who has power over the spirits of the dead. Arimanes is seated upon his throne
surrounded by the Spirits and attended by three Destinies
and Nemesis. When Manfred enters The Hall, the Spirits are surprised by his arrival and quickly order him to pay homage to their lord.
What is here?
A mortal! – Thou most rash and fatal wretch,
Bow down and worship! …
Prostrate thyself, and thy condemned clay,
Child of the Earth! Or dread the worst.
In a significant act of
defiance Manfred refuses to bow to the king, thus running the risk of being
tortured or killed. He no longer cares if he lives or dies. Arimanes, with his
attendants, the Destinies, possess the power to summon and control other
spirits. He gives permission for his servant Nemesis to call Astarte from the
dead.
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| Manfred illustration by Juliusz Kossak |
I cannot speak to her – but bid her speak –
Forgive me or condemn me.
Nemesis informs him that she cannot force Astarte to speak to him - as Astarte belongs to the forces of good – not evil. Astarte’s spectral form offers no forgiveness and only says his name and a final ‘Farewell’ before disappearing. Manfred is devastated.
Thou lovedst me
Too much, as I loved thee: we – were not made
To torture thus each other, though it were
The deadliest sin to love as we have loved
Say that thou loath’st me not – that I do bear
This punishment for both – that thou wilt be
One of the blessed – and that I shall die:
Manfred finally gets help to
summon up Astarte from the dead and asks again for her forgiveness. She offers
no forgiveness and predicts that he will die the next day. This is a welcome
prediction as ‘Tomorrow ends thy earthly ills.’
The Abbot of St. Maurice has
heard about Manfred’s state of mind and visits the Castle to talk to him about
repentance for the evil deeds he has done during his life.
’Tis said thou holdest converse with the things
Which are forbidded to the search of man.
there is still time
For penitence and pity: reconcile thee
With the true church, and through the church of heaven.
Manfred refuses to repent in
this way, as it is contrary to his own religious beliefs. He retreats to the
tower to await death.
What ev’er I may have been, or am, doth rest between
Heaven and myself. – I shall not choose a mortal
To be my mediator…
I have had those earthly visions
And noble aspirations in my youth
The Abbot of St. Maurice
returns to the castle later in the evening only to be told by Herman, Manfred’s
servant, that the tower is a private sanctuary and that visitors are not
permitted to enter. He enters anyway and witnesses Manfred arguing with a
spirit or demon that has come to take him to his death.
I see a dusk and awful figure rise,
Like an infernal god, from out the earth.
…Ah! He unveils his aspect: on his brow
The thunder – scars are graven, from his eye
Glares forth the immortality oh hell<
Manfred is already dying and wants to die alone. Requiring solitude for his final moments, he abruptly dismisses the daemon.
I knew and know my hour is come, but not
To render up my soul to such as thee:
Away! I’ll die as I have lived – alone…
My life is in its last hour, that I know,
Thou hasn’t no power upon me, that I feel.
Thou shalt never possess me, that I know:
What I have done is done; I bear within
A torture which could nothing gain from thine:
Thou didst not tempt me, and thou could not tempt me.
I have not been they dupe, nor am thy prey –
But was my own destroyer, and will be
My own hereafter. – Back, ye baffled fiends!
The hand of death is upon me but not yours!
The Abbot takes Manfred by
the hand and asks him how he is feeling. In their final discourse, the Abbot
makes his last attempt to help Manfred receive absolution and salvation – ‘Give
thy prayers to Heaven – Pray – albeit but in thought, - but die not thus’.
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| Manfred illustration by Juliusz Kossak |
Manfred’s last words are
addressed to the Abbot - ‘Give me thy hand - - Old man it is not difficult
to die’.
Some critics believe Manfred’s love for Astarte is an autobiographical manifestation of Byron’s guilt for loving his half-sister Augusta, and that she was the inspiration for the play. Interestingly, the drama also reflects Byron’s own religious beliefs and his refusal to submit to external authority. The timing of Byron’s own death was predicted by a soothsayer in Scotland during his youth, and in his last hours, Byron also achieved his own form of peace and acceptance of death.
Byron’s Literary Legacy
The Byronic Heroes, notably The
Corsair and Manfred, inspired composers from the Romantic era of
classical music c.1820-1900. Manfred was not intended for the theatre.
It was classified as a ‘Romantic Closet Drama’ – written for the page rather
than the stage. It was adapted to music by the German composer, Robert Schumann
in 1849. The Manfred Symphony was completed by the Russian composer, Pyotr
Ilyich Tchaikovsky, in 1885. Other famous works by composers of the Romantic
era are -
- Giuseppe Verdi – The Corsair
and The Two Foscari
- Hector Berlioz – The Corsair and Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage
- Franz Liszt – The Corsair, Manfred and Sardanapalus
Byron’s legacy lives on to this day, not only in his poetry but also in his creation of the Byronic Hero. The persona of a brooding, melancholic and tormented man who defies convention can be identified in the characters of -
- Heathcliffe
(Wuthering Heights)
- Rochester (Jane
Eyre)
- Captain Ahab
(Moby Dick)
- Michael Corleone
(The Godfather)
- Bruce Wayne
(Batman)
- Severus Snape (Harry
Potter)
- Erik (Phantom of
the Opera)
It is perhaps Heathcliffe in Wuthering Heights and Erik in Phantom of the Opera who stand out at the more extreme end of the spectrum.
Heathcliffe – a tormented phantom in the eyes of society due to his brooding and vengeful nature and status as an outcast, exemplifies the Byronic Hero through his combination of admirable and deplorable traits.
Just as a phantom is defined as a spectral, often unseen entity, Byronic
heroes are shrouded in a dark allure and can be considered as a form of
phantom, due to their elusive, ephemeral, and mysterious nature. A man’s dark
and mysterious past, haunted by secrets and sins yet to be revealed and with an
intriguing charismatic magnetism engages the reader in much the same way as a
phantom’s alluring, and often terrifying spectral nature. Erik, the Phantom of the Opera combines a
literal embodiment of a phantom with the traits of a Byronic Hero.
It is also possible to draw an analogy with the way Sophia Hyatt: The White Ghost of Newstead Abbey, related to Byron’s poetry. She had never met the man himself. It was as if his poetry created a phantom in her mind to which she could readily relate and with whom she would communicate.
‘‘I ne’er have drunk thy glance – thy form
My earthly eye has never seen,
Though oft when fancy’s visions warm
It greets me in some blissful dream.’’
